Discovery date 24 September 1960 Orbits Sun | MPC designation 8121 Altdorfer Discovered 24 September 1960 Asteroid group Asteroid belt | |
Alternative names 2572 P-L · 1972 GR11990 SU29 People also search for Sun, 9511 Klingsor, 11767 Milne | ||
8121 Altdorfer, provisional designation 2572 P-L, is a stony Flora asteroid from the inner regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 2 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 24 September 1960, by Dutch astronomer couple Ingrid and Cornelis van Houten at Leiden, on photographic plates taken by Dutch–American astronomer Tom Gehrels at the U.S. Palomar Observatory, California.
The S-type asteroid is a member of the Flora family, one of the largest groups of stony asteroids in the main-belt. It orbits the Sun at a distance of 2.0–2.5 AU once every 3 years and 4 months (1,223 days). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.10 and an inclination of 3° with respect to the ecliptic. No precoveries were taken prior to its discovery.
According to the survey carried out by the NEOWISE mission of NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, the asteroid measures 2.5 kilometers in diameter and its surface has a high albedo of 0.35, while the Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link assumes an albedo of 0.24 – derived from the family's principal body and namesake, the asteroid 8 Flora – and calculates a diameter of 2.1 kilometers, based on an absolute magnitude of 15.59.
A rotational light-curve was obtained through photometric observations at the U.S. Palomar Transient Factory in January 2012. The light-curve shows a period of 7000402210000000000♠4.0221±0.0018 hours with a brightness variation of 0.34 in magnitude (U=2).
The survey designation "P-L" stands for Palomar–Leiden, named after the fruitful Palomar–Leiden survey, a collaboration between the Palomar and Leiden Observatory in the 1960s. Gehrels used Palomar's Samuel Oschin telescope (also known as the 48-inch Schmidt Telescope), and shipped the photographic plates to Ingrid and Cornelis van Houten at Leiden Observatory where astrometry was carried out. The trio are credited with the discovery of several thousand minor planets.
The minor planet is named in honour of German Renaissance painter Albrecht Altdorfer (1480–1538). As a member of the Danube school, he was the first to paint landscapes without figures. Altdorfer was also an architect of the city of Regensburg, Germany, after which the minor planet 927 Ratisbona is named, and was also a significant printmaker, with numerous (copper) engravings and woodcuts. Naming citation was published on 2 April 1999 (M.P.C. 34345).